Has the Poverty Rate Remained Unchanged Since the War on Poverty Began?

Few things in American politics have been more hotly and consistently argued in the last half-century than the legacy of President Lyndon Johnson’s War on Poverty.

In a 1986 speech on welfare reform, President Ronald Reagan took several jabs at Johnson’s initiative, saying:

“[When] the famous War on Poverty was declared… a funny thing happened. Poverty, as measured by dependency, stopped shrinking and then actually began to grow worse. I guess you could say, poverty won the war.”

Today, the bipartisan debate continues. Democrats and Republicans argue whether welfare programs work and if the poverty rate actually shrank since Johnson declared the War on Poverty.

On June 7, U.S. Rep. John Shimkus, R-Ill., tweeted:

When LBJ started #WarOnPoverty, 14% of Americans lived in poverty. 50 yrs later, 14% still do. There's a #BetterWay: https://t.co/3vPtYdbVOV
— John Shimkus (@RepShimkus) June 7, 2016

Shimkus was promoting House Speaker Paul Ryan’s “A Better Way” agenda that looks at, among other things, poverty and welfare reform.

But just as America has changed since the Johnson administration, so has the way the government measures poverty. Does Shimkus take those changes into consideration in his tweet? We decided to investigate his claims about the nation’s poverty record and how much it has changed since the War on Poverty was declared.

Here's our analysis of Shimkus' claim and our rating on the Truth-O-Meter.

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